Monday, September 23, 2024. Beautiful, sunny days throughout the weekend, despite the predictions of overcast and maybe some rain.
The Summer season is officially over in my neighborhood where the two girls schools opened their doors again last week. And now every weekday morning, and then in the mid-afternoon, there are yellow school buses double-parked along the avenue awaiting, along with blocks of double-parked private cars from modest to six-figure jobbies, also awaiting. To us residents, it’s all business as usual. And it’s kind of reassuring of the possibilities to get along in life.
To this resident it means my calendar is filling up, including social events of which there were three on my calendar in the past ten days.
I’ve been to four of them recently — the first being the 94th birthday celebration of John Loeb Jr. which I wrote about last week. It certainly stunned the guests the moment you entered of the vast main dining room of the Metropolitan Club. You knew from the looks of the reception hall when you entered the building that the place had been transported into something personal because of the multitude of black and white portraits of the birthday boy from all ages of his now long life.
And then there were the fourteen foot-high brick posts holding entrance gates to his family estate in Purchase, indicating something vast lay beyond. It was a kind of artist’s interpretation of the ancient family property on which John resides with his wife Sharon, whom I later learned had created this entire celebration and production.
There were at least 200 guests in black tie sitting in the vast room in the clubhouse on the corner of 61st Street and Fifth Avenue. Put there more than century ago, it represents that part of a still-growing city much still occupied by the wilderness above Central Park with the Plaza Hotel across the way, built in 1906; and the vast Vanderbilt block-long mansion on the south corner. All within the purview of Mr. Morgan’s Metropolitan Club windows, which were all covered over that night in order to re-create the “environment” and bring John’s friends to his beloved family home just north of the city.
The following week, Katherine Bryan celebrated her birthday at Al Vaporetto (which is a small single dining room) next to Antonucci. Katherine held it there last year as well. It’s very intimate in a comfortable even homey way. But artful.
Katherine’s eldest son George Gurley was present. She has two other sons who are not nearby, but I know having spent time with her and all three sons that they all love their mother and mother adores them back. It’s sort of like the “proud” mother, but with Katherine it’s more like “awe” as she is fascinated by each of them.
There were 18 or 20 at the table, all friends obviously from here as well as Palm Beach and Los Angeles. And George Hamilton, who still looks like a movie star and now has white hair. I comment because George is an “older” man (as am I) but he looks exactly as he looked in the movies. A real star.
The menu is Antonucci, which is right next door, with the same staff. Emilia and Pepe Fanjul were there. Pepe was telling us that he actually met Mr. Antonucci many years ago when Pepe acquired Casa de Campo. Mr. Antonucci had been the chef of the previous owner.
The evening at the table was full of conversation, and the birthday girl sitting at the head of the table was enjoying all the activity going on around her. The food was delicious, the cake was extraordinary (I should have got the cake-maker because he’s considered one of the best in the city). There were a couple of candles on the vast cake although they were really there for traditions sake. Our hostess is quite apparently ageless, and of course shows it.
Four days later, Geoffrey Bradfield gave not one but two dinners for his longtime friend Yue-Sai Kan, who has written her memoir The Most Famous Woman in China; and how she did it.
I met and wrote about Yue-Sai two decades ago here in Manhattan where she has a classic large and comfortable mansion on the Upper East Side that she’s owned for decades. Besides being beautiful, she is very enterprising. She started out life here in Hawaii at age 16 and has since made a huge impact on China’s beauty standards through her iconic cosmetics brand.
On the surface, it’s a story about an extremely talented and enterprising girl, but also one of ambition, influence, and resilience.
Geoffrey hosted a dinner for twenty in her honor in the garden at Majorelle. The restaurant was very busy.
And then, this past Saturday, Scott Currie hosted a birthday dinner celebration (“six-oh”) for himself, black tie at The River Club on East 54th Street overlooking the River.
I know Scott through business. He’s got a pubic relations business focusing on marketing communications and brand strategies for global luxury, lifestyle and fashion companies including re-brand efforts, special events, advertising campaigns and new product launches.
I could see that the style and organization of the evening, which was impeccable and beautiful; and the lighting flattered one and all. It was swank, and in that old-fashioned (but updated) sense. You were the guest and everything was for you. Including the delicious dinner, excellent service, and beautiful tables, and of course the entertainment.
I report that because although the idea of putting on black tie on Saturday on my end of the (my) business is not unusual, nor is it a big deal, But Saturdays? Not really.
Nevertheless, I knew our host being devoted to his profession and a stickler for style; and now celebrating a birthday of note (for him) — with performing entertainment, cocktails and dinner, and of course cake and champagne — would make for a very good dinner party. Actually a GREAT party.
All of the men in black tie, lots of Scott’s pals and professional connections, the women — all fashion-wise including Nikki Haskell who had just flown in from L.A., and Martha Stewart dressed in chic — looked great; and along with the six chorus girls dancing and singing three numbers, and then everyone dancing, it was all a great way to spend a Saturday evening in New York.
And Happy Birthday Scott … may you celebrate again and again. Or at least enough to show others (i.e. sharp clients) how to pull it off so brilliantly and glamorously.
